Our planet and our species are in danger

re:

by Thom Hartmann A...

Jun. 26, 2012 8:31 am

it might be wise to reconsider buying waterfront property on the East coast of the United States. A new report by the U.S. Geological Survey finds that sea-levels are rising four times faster along the east coast of the U.S. than they are globally. This sea level rise will increase the likelihood of flooding and high intensity storms in major cities along the east coast like New York, Boston, and even Washington, DC.

But that’s just the start of it. The International Energy Agency is warning that if carbon emissions continue increasing at their current rate – then global temperatures will increase by six degrees Celsius by 2100, killing off most of the animals on the planet – and threatening the survival of the entire human species.

The writing on the wall is clear – our planet and our species are in danger. Unfortunately, Republicans in Congress continue to plug their ears and close their eyes in the face of growing climate change evidence, just as their oil baron campaign donors pay them to do

Comments

re: Our planet and our species are in danger

by .ren

Jun. 26, 2012 9:52 am

I think it's a little more complicated than blaming the Republicans. Please read through some of the efforts to provide revelatory information about the complex causes to an impending global ecological collapse on this thread, especially related to the failures resulting from international efforts at coming to a coordinated preventative global solution like the one attempted at the recent Rio+20 conference this June.

Those failures are a variant repeat of the ones that resulted from a similar effort in 1992, which were followed by global environmentally deregulating agreements like NAFTA and GATT, enthusiastically embraced and pushed by the Clinton Administration. Of course today that mistake is only argued from the economic perspective of a loss of "jobs" in the U.S. and not the related environmental catastrophe that goes with promoting neoliberal globalism.

Also, how does information like the following articles compute into the "blame Republicans" scenario?

re: Our planet and our species are in danger

by douglaslee

Jun. 28, 2012 2:52 pm

North Carolina is handling their local risk from sea level rise by choosing different Luntz words to describe it. The flood authorization bill I think got passed. It was going to be ignored until Debby Did Florida. The amount of dollars in property loss now with CO wildfires added in, tornados, coastal floods and maybe a hurricane or two might begin to get some attention. Fema ought to start limiting coverage for beach property.

Insurance industry, because it is now combined with banks actually has the power to change policy. However, they will most likely assure they get a bailout when the next disaster hits.

Burke [After the Warming] predicted resolution by 2050. The figures accumulating are astounding, I thought I was going to be dead before the destruction comes, but I'm not so sure now.